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Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Even here at the end of the school year, like most of you I imagine, I am looking toward the next year, thinking about how I can improve my work with teachers and students: searching for new ideas to improve teaching, to communicate more clearly, and to create closer collegial relationships. In between all the personal summer activities, I will read and think and make notes and gather resources. There lately was an article from Education Week titled “Teaching Is Not A Part-Time Job”. Here is the link: http://svteach.wikispaces.com/Teachers'+Work+Goes+Beyond+the+School+Day

I find that I make so many connections to what I observe, on TV sometimes, and in other activities that I do. Yesterday, I watched most of the Indie 500 race, and early in this most prestigious race, I began to apply what I saw to teaching. This time, while the ending holds just one winner, the entire broadcast information held much to be applied to education. First of all, they showed the history of the race, this year 100 years old, with the primitive model-t racers that climbed to 75 mph, to the near-rocket cars of today that reach 220 mph. In between are innovations, tweaking of new applications, brains working overtime to create the best racing (read ‘learning’) possible for the cars. And the drivers themselves today learn they must strengthen their hands, to be able to hold onto the shaking steering wheels at such high speeds, must workout even like the Olympians to be able to endure the nearly four hour race. We too have historical background in education that supports what we do. Innovators in our history have given us basic knowledge that we use again and again, and much of it hasn’t gone out of style. We too have to stay in shape, perhaps not like the Olympians, but most of all, we keep up with the best practices that are proven; to read what we must takes stamina, while to use what we learn takes endurance in the classroom, keeping up with different groups, different individuals.

During the race I noticed that the pit crew was discussed at length, including how much they practiced in order to get ready for the event, how they rehearsed in order to shave even parts of seconds off the time taken to change tires, re-fuel, and make minor adjustments. Teachers often teach to the moment, also making minor changes as they assess what is happening in the group, or to an individual. They form the pit crew that keeps the car going, don’t they, working alongside (or with) the driver?

And who is the driver? I believe it’s an ebb and flow between the teacher and the students, a companionship that could be akin to teaching the student to drive, directing with details, teaching as much as you know about learning, then the gradual release so that the student is driving alone. Having learned what is offered as well as possible, the student takes over, practicing, getting the needed help from the pit crew, but this time it’s the driver who must make the crucial decisions that help complete the race. The classroom/students are also the car, also interacting with the driver and given support by the pit crew. One story that resonated with me was the race by Danica Patrick, who placed 10th in this Indie 500. During the race, the car ran hot and the pit crew, all the background help, made changes at every pit stop, trying to reduce the heat, to keep the car running as well as could be, with Danica herself making changes in the way she raced, to give the best chance for success. She didn’t win, but the car did complete the race without breaking down, and the different changes made by the pit crew helped that happen. Hurrah for teachers who keep tweaking their methods in order to differentiate the learning for each student, and achieve success.

I guess that many might think this connection is a little silly, yet when I make connections like this; I share them with my teachers and students, because I want more than anything for them to understand the myriad parts that encompass the practice of teaching and the components of learning. It is hoped that those same teachers and students begin to examine anything they wish to understand more fully, in the minute parts that create success.

Monday, May 30, 2011

Yesterday was the third day I’ve had without going to work, although I'm not quite finished at school, as we have two and one half days more with students this week, then final staff meeting and staff party. The hourglass is nearly empty. We had a lot to do the past days, running errands, going to a movie, and visiting my daughter, son-in-law and granddaughter for a few hours, helping them with some lawn work (mostly though, playing with Ingrid). In between errands, I’ve been doing those last minute school tasks, like wrapping goodbye gifts and writing thank you notes.

Yesterday, we hung out mostly, so I put ingredients for a stew in a slow cooker, and I’ve kept busy on the mission of cleaning out things-first drawers, then some closets, etc. I found no surprises, (or money), but did fill another box for give-aways & a bag of things for various people at school. My mantra is use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without. It’s an old World War II saying, when many had to live that way in order to help the war effort. It’s interesting how today there is much talk that supports that saying; we’ve come to believe that doing what we can to waste less is a good thing for the planet.

School ending gives me such energy for home things. It’s almost the same feeling when spring fever hits, and I yearn to be outside, in the garden, without a coat! It is bittersweet to say goodbye to continuing students who are leaving for good, but we all feel the pull of summer, the almost visceral need to do something different, whether it’s to stay at home, go on vacation, or just take a few hours every day in the garden, tending the new growth.

So today, I puttered, I cleaned, and I sat on the patio a while, and while there, a gift came by. A hawk flew in, and landed on one of our fence posts. Guess he was hanging out too, although probably for dinner. He didn’t stay long, but it was a great thing to see. I didn’t have a camera, and if I’d moved, he too would have taken off. So, he’s just in my mind’s eye, a beautiful thing, making his way in this almost-summer world, just like I am.

Sunday, May 29, 2011

Yesterday was my brother's birthday. We live far away, so I sent a card and a gift, and we called him last night. He is my only sibling, and special to me. We're looking forward to a long visit this summer when we return to my home state. He, his wife, my husband and I love to travel the back roads, looking for terrific little cafes, general stores, and antique shops. It's just fun to be together and I wish we were closer, but glad we do spend time together as much as possible. A poem for Jim,

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Today is my son and daughter-in-law’s fifteenth anniversary. They, with their nine-year-old son, are the part of my family that moved to another state this year, and it’s the first time we haven’t been able to take them out to dinner, or send them out while we babysat our grandchild. I have thought of them all day, and all the fun we’ve had through the years together. They’ve helped us so many times, and we’ve helped them too. My husband closed a retail business several years ago, and weekend after weekend; they came to the store to help clean it out, to get it ready to close. We have kept our grandson countless days, and then weeks at a time, for just fun, and sometimes when family tragedies created the need. We have cooked for each other, joined each other’s friends’ lives, traveled together, laughed and cried together. I am so proud of them and their committed lives together, and miss them a bunch.

When my son was young, he played often with the little people toys of Fisher-Price. One of those favorite people was the little red-haired girl. Is it fate that he met and then married a red-haired girl, or did that earlier sweet connection create the later attraction? Funny how life goes, isn’t it?

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

One of the important aspects of the school ‘s philosophy where I work is that we give students so much choice in their learning. For example, each year they choose a personal unit of study around which teachers build the learning appropriate to each child’s needs. The choices also spread to mini classes that students have a couple of times a week, personal book goals, writing goals in workshop, etc. While this is challenging both for teachers and students to make good decisions for learning, it works well almost all of the time. Numerous conversations happen to help students learn the skills of making good choices, like how to look ahead to foresee consequences or what might be the next ‘step’ of learning in a particular curriculum area. It doesn’t always go smoothly, and we teachers have our own continuing dialogs to find good ways to support the way this best works for students and the way we teach.

I give this lengthy introduction because I wanted to describe a challenge I had this week that involved choice. I have been substituting for a teacher in a ‘mini’ creative writing class, and in her plans, she told me that students were working on a fiction story or a memoir—their choice. They had completed a lot of support in those areas before beginning. We met at the tech lab, and in the first session I was teaching, one student struggled with focusing on a goal. She at first told me that the teacher had said that the students could write anything, but when questioned, other students confirmed the two choices mentioned earlier. The young woman finally got some of a list typed, and after some conversation, thought that she could connect the list (of very long words) to things that had happened to her—a sort of memoir. I supported the idea, and asked her to write a couple of sentences as an introduction to explain to her readers what she was doing. She was resistant, saying that it was her ‘choice’ to have readers just use their imagination and figure out her plan. I have used reasons to persuade her that occurred to me first, like usually writers want to communicate to readers as well as they can, to be clear, and to not confuse. And, I suggested it might be fun to begin with a question using one of the words, asking readers to connect their own memories with that word, and that too was a way that readers would understand her writing goal.

Nothing changed this student’s mind. She insisted it wasn’t necessary to tell, that readers surely were smart enough to figure it out.

The goal of this class is for all students to complete two pieces, work some on revision, and to create a book of all the writing. I have my own choice to make with only a few classes to go. It is such a dilemma, to honor the writer’s/student’s decision, or to insist that certain guidelines be followed. If the subject matter is hurtful to others, I have no problem telling the writer that changes needed to be made, but because this writer actually is writing, and just resisting a suggestion, I’m not so sure I shouldn’t just let it go.

Giving students choices means taking risks as educators, yet the dialog that this student and I are having is learning too, and the fact that she is willing to defend her choice is admirable. She may see the consequence in the sharing, when her readers get confused. That is one natural consequence that could occur. No one will make fun, they will just ask questions.

Look at the snow back in the mountains once again, soon to be here-perhaps tomorrow night.30’s 40’s 50’s in the next 24 hours, we have good air quality, but 54 at the most tomorrow, although it could get to 68 by Monday.Too bad for the weekend-stay tuned for the future four!

Friday, May 20, 2011

I've written earlier about my collection of poems that say goodbye, and as we are now living the final days of this school year, I've written another goodbye poem. This time, all but two of the students I have had in my classroom will be leaving, moving on to high school. They are special because they hold a place as part of the group of students in my last classroom, and so it's time again to say goodbye.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

My daughter is pregnant with her second child now-due in August, has a two year old, works a challenging full time job, and sounds tired lately. She lives near, but mostly we talk on the phone in the evenings. I have thought back to the taking care of children when I was a mom with the kids still here, and some of the care given when they were ill. When our adult children are ill, or just tired, we can't do those things we used to do, at least very much. I've written a poem that tried to capture one of those moments.

How To Comfort A Sick Daughter

How to comfort
a daughter out of sorts:
Offer hug immediately,
then bring the thermometer, and
perhaps a cold cloth.
Finally, ice water and saltines,
the blue and white afghan
and of course
the cat.
Close the blinds;
begin the Mozart - quietly.
Start boiling the water
for
potato soup.
Write a quick note that says I love you,
but in French.
Give one more hug
and leave the room.
(She needs the rest!)

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

All students in the school where I work go on many trips, day and extended, and for a variety of reasons. They work with different teachers on these trips, and sometimes with their core teachers also. From the five year olds to those about to move on to high school, thirteen or fourteen year olds, studies of the outdoors and the way the world works in other ways according to students’ individual interests occur. I taught the middle school group for numerous years until moving into a literacy coaching position last year, and we traveled numerous places through the years, changing themes, but most important, experiencing the world as it happened in order to add to the information they had already studied in print, whether online or in published books.

This past week, instead of an extended overnight trip, I had the pleasure of one extended day with a group of early primary students, mostly fives and a few fours. We spent much of the day at the farm of a teacher at the school. As I worked with the group and talked and helped students with different tasks, I was struck by the similarities between this Tuesday-until-almost-dinner trip and the ten-to-twelve-day trips I took with older students. They came to add information to that already studied, through print that was shared during the day, and by field journal writing and sketching that captured more information. Here are examples of just a few ways that reading and writing was used before and during the trip:

First, students were so prepared for the experience. They knew all the things they had in their packs, and were able to access them quickly, like snack, water bottle, lunch, second layer, rain layer. They showed they were ready for travel. Teachers this time carried the field journals during the set aside journal time, but the students were ready to capture learning as soon as one activity was completed, and journals were always accessible. For example, they watered the mulch around baby plants, learning how the mulch holds moisture for them, and then they wrote about the plants and chose a favorite one to sketch. With adults helping, they wrote one new fact learned about the plants.

All during the year, this particular class has studied food and how it comes to the table for their special class unit. In addition to other trips, they began the year at this same farm, learning about harvest time and picking cucumbers so they could make pickles. They have read books about plants and how they grow, and in the fall, were able to examine different stages of growth, including the plants’ flowers that then turned into the food. On one trip they took to a different farm, they got to dig potatoes. At lunchtime on this day, we all shared the pickles made from the cucumbers picked months ago.

Last week, so I could get to know the class a bit better, and they could get to know me, I read the book Tops and Bottoms, by Janet Stevens to the group. It was a good choice at this time, because the humor is subtle and yet the class knew so much after their yearlong study of how food grows that they immediately understood the trick played by the rabbit on the bear. During one conversation in the garden, they examined the parts of a rhubarb plant, and learned how the ‘tops and bottom’ were poisonous, and only the middle was eaten. Students remembered the book and referred to it in the discussion.

The current read-aloud of the class is Charlotte’s Web, by E.B. White, and one of the teachers read after lunch in the chicken house, among the chickens, ducks, and one gobbling turkey. It was another special moment, and more than one child pointed out the spider webs hanging on the walls, wondering if there was a relative of Charlotte living near.

Later in the afternoon, we traveled to a nearby lake and looked at some of the plants found at the edge of the water, like cattails, and discussed their uses, including food and nest-making materials. Students got to break off some of the dried cattails and pull the seed fluff, sending it into the wind. Another book studied was about seeds, so they knew just what the wind was going to do.

Finally, we had a late treat before boarding the buses for the return home: homemade ice cream that had been made earlier in the week at school. An earlier study of dairy cows and the food produced from them had also included cheese making, but now the sweet ice cream with strawberries proved to be a fine end to a special day.

The connection between hands-on activities and the use of what was learned previously was strong during the trip. Using information learned showed students the usefulness of research, how it helps inform the questioning when in the field, and how being in the field can confirm what was seen in the earlier research. It’s quite a satisfying circle that we at school hope continues with our students during whatever they read and then experience.

Monday, May 16, 2011

Closing in on night and that time before full dark is a magical time. I remember hide and seek games during the time when it was just a little bit scary because shadows were deeper and times when I could sit on the porch, lazily listening to the grown-ups talk as we all finished our days. Some of this feeling is captured in the movie To Kill A Mockingbird, that sweet, sweet time before being called home after having such adventures with the neighbor kids after supper. So I wrote about it, but just a little poem. It hopefully will bring more specific personal memories of that time to those who read it.

Sunday, May 15, 2011

My daughter wants to build a teepee for her daughter, Ingrid, to play in this summer, so they both arrived at our house with poles and ideas. Unfortunately, the weather turned rainy and cold, so we stayed indoors and had a great visit, watching Ingrid play and talking about the coming summer, along with teepee ideas. We found a pattern that looked good on Amazon, and ordered it; ate tamales that I bought at the farmer's market earlier in the morning, and just had a lazy day, not exactly as anticipated, but maybe what we needed. My two year old granddaughter is a busy girl, sweet and delightful. It is such fun to see her that I often wish they lived down the block and not so far away (30 minutes into the city). When she is here, no other priorities exist; she is here.

Friday, May 13, 2011

Well, somehow yesterday's post was lost, along with some comments on the previous one, so I am going to post my Thursday post again. It may end up a double, if they restore things as blogger have said they would. This seems a bit funny now, because we in Denver had two wonderful rainy days on Wednesday & Thursday, hence the poem below. Today is the usual bright, sunny spring day, but the rain was sorely needed & it was wonderful to be inside with rain tapping on the windows. At school, the students seem to enjoy the difference also, even happy to have a chance for quiet worktime, & lunch inside for a change.

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

As a classroom teacher and as a literacy coach, I read so many books to find new ideas to share that will enhance our literacy program. I search for books for specific individuals and groups, mentor texts for writing workshop, and read-alouds to share special content and find new ways to see others’ lives as well as our own.The ideas presented in the books also promote rich discussions, in whole classes or small groups.Books form a spine of the school’s curriculum, and it seems important not only to find the new authors who are exploring new ways to communicate through print—like the recent explosion of graphic novels—as well as to review books that have been in print a while, even a long while, to access their value.This time, it’s a new book I’d like to recommend.

Published last fall, and lately awarded the Jane Addams Children’s Book Award for older readers, A Long Walk To Water, by Linda Sue Park, fills several goals mentioned above, and I liked it so much that I wanted to share about it in this Tuesday’s slice.It is a recent read and I loved it, was inspired by it, and hope you will be, too.

The book is based on the true story of Salva Dut, a Sudanese refugee who fled his home village at the age of eleven because of war. Salva became one of the ‘Lost Boys of Sudan‘, immigrating to the U.S. in the 1990s.He is the inspiration and the founder of Water for Sudan.In the book, Park switches viewpoints and stories between the boy Salva who in 1985 was forced to flee his home after his village was attacked and a girl from 2008 contemporary Sudan who walks eight hours each day to get water for her family.The changing viewpoints across the years create interest in the story, and begin with the two children 23 years apart, but slowly, as the book progresses, brings them together.Park weaves a difficult and complicated story well, crossing the divide of 23 years in a clear (but uncomplicated) style.

There are several ways I might share this book in the classroom:

oAs a book group, with a study of unique ways of telling true stories as historical fiction.

oAs a read aloud that will include many discussions of other ways of living, in challenging circumstances, but without giving up.Discussion of personal traits, like persistence through adversity and determination to reach one’s goal comprises the ‘other’ curriculum that teachers cover for our students.

oAlso, a class might be embarking on a search for a service project, and reading this story together could inspire students to see needs that they might not have understood before.

oAs a book goal for a particular student (or group) that might be reading and studying different ways of living, including challenges, attempting to figure out the characters’ source of strength and determination.As one reads the book, a consistent question underlying the story is ‘how do they manage?’ or “how do they keep going, accepting the responsibility over and over?”

It’s wonderful to find a new book to add to my collection of books to use in the classroom and of course, I am always searching for more!